Never Let Me Wake
by ShaynaJacobs
Summary: He never thought that dreams would tie him to them across the fabric of time. How can the Doctor cope with seeing Rose and Tentoo together in her world while his is falling apart? RosexTen, RosexTentoo, TentooxTen, All variations thereof.
1. Prologue

_Rating: R_

_Pairings: Ten/Rose, Tentoo/Rose, Ten/Tentoo, Tentoo/Ten/Rose, Ten/Tentoo/Rose, Ten/Rose/Tentoo (and all variations thereof)_

_A/N: I have to love my friends who convince me in a single afternoon that writing fanfiction is something I need to take up again._

Everyone knew that living meant dying in the end. He knew only too well what dying felt like. Dying didn't scare him anymore, loss is what scared him. Losing a piece of himself was familiar, after all, he had worn almost a dozen faces in his life. Losing a piece of his heart was something else.

He had lost his heart to a girl at the end of the world. She followed him no matter how crazy he seemed. She looked into time in order to save his life, risking herself in the process. She loved him even when he changed, leaving a little bit of himself behind.

_If she could have held on… If she could have waited just a few more seconds…_ He brushed the thoughts from his mind and focused on the important. He had to see her one more time, just so he could tell her to secret that he hoped she already knew.

He didn't believe in anything beyond time or space, but at times like this he wished he could.

The Tardis showed him the way. She taught him how to speak to the woman who had once looked deeper into time than any besides the Time Lords had ever dared.

His hearts pounded as he adjusted the power and prepared to enter her dreams.


	2. Chapter 1: The Time Between

**_Chapter 1: The Time Between_**

_A/N: Forgive the time jumps made in this chapter. I don't think that Torchwood would believe a thing Rose said in her application and she needed to have something to do in the time between left behind and walking between worlds. Behold my version of reality._

"I know I said he wasn't good enough for you." Jackie Tyler hugged her daughter close and whispered in her ear. "But he kept his promise. You're safe because of him." For years, Jackie had worried that the Doctor would be the reason for her daughter's death. How strange it was to have him to thank for this new life.

Rose wouldn't stop crying. She had been crying for hours, ever since they left the bay. Each sob wrenched Jackie's heart in two and she wished there was some comfort she could give to her daughter. Once, Jackie had lost the man she loved, but the Doctor had brought him back to her. She wished more than anything that she could do the same for Rose. The landscape passed by outside the windows of the zeppelin. Nothing on this world could give the answer to how to fix her daughter's broken heart.

Rose clung to her mother with everything that she had. None of the rest would understand, but her mother did. Rose's eyes burned and her nose threatened to drip once again on her mother's coat. The Doctor would have laughed about that. He would have made a joke that could bring an end to her tears.

Losing him had always been a possibility. He had a tendency to run towards excitement, even when he claimed that he loved running away. She had seen him change his face and wondered if the man she loved was still inside the handsome new stranger. But even with all of that, somehow she always believed that she would be the one left behind eventually.

She would die, or be left home when he realized that the danger was too great. He would decide to run away because he had finally realized what her heart had been telling her from the moment that he had comforted her when the Earth met its end. Willingly leaving him had never entered her mind, despite her mother's urgings.

Rose took a deep breath and pulled away from her mother.

"Well, lemme check if Torchwood accepted my application." The false smile plastered on her face didn't fool anyone. Mickey looked like he wanted to say something, but a sharp glare from Jackie kept him silent.

Rose would have to move on. At least now she knew how much the Doctor cared for her, even though she had never heard the final words. She would live with the knowledge that she had won the hearts of the Last of the Time Lords and had calmed the rage of the Oncoming Storm.

She rummaged in her bag for the tablet that she had been carrying since coming to this new world. Needing to constantly look up the smallest details about history had been frustrating, but now she felt she had some grasp of the universe she lived in.

Stretching out her legs and sighing with relief at the fact that they were no longer trapped in the jeep that had brought them to the edge of the sea, Rose began to check her inbox.

Whispering on the other side of the cabin threatened to draw her attention, but she kept her eyes glued firmly to the screen, despite not being able to focus on the words in front of her. The tears still rimmed her eyes, but this time she wouldn't let them fall. She wouldn't regret the life she had with him. He had shown her too much for her to be weak in the face of losing him. Being with the Doctor had shown her just how strong she could be.

Blindly, she tapped the first message, while trying to dry her eyes on her sleeve. She curled up with the tablet, closing herself off from the people around her.

_Ms. Tyler,_

_Thank you for your interest in a position at the Torchwood Institute. However, without independent verification of your qualifications and no formal engineering or science education post-secondary school, we cannot offer you a position at this time. We will be willing to reevaluate your application at a later date if you decide to reapply._

_Vincent Brighton, Head of Human Resources, Torchwood Institute, London Branch_

That was it. She no longer had the Doctor and now she had no way of keeping herself busy. Working at a shop offered her too much time to think, which she desperately wanted to avoid.

Rose put on a pair of headphones, glad that no one in Pete's world still used ear pods, and attempted to rest.

* * *

"I'm worried about her. She's not coping with what's happened."

"Give her a month, Jacks, she'll find something." Pete marveled at the strength of his daughter from another world. He was certain that he would not have lasted through his Jackie's death if she had not changed so much from the woman he had fallen in love with. Rose was mourning in a completely different way than he had, and he thought that she might need some space, space that Jackie wasn't thrilled about giving her.

Seeing the mother and daughter together reminded him of all he had gained in the past months. His assets had been returned to him, following his successful mission to keep the Cybermen from returning. He had his wife back, a beautiful, strong daughter and a little one on the way. His dreams and inventions were being used by Torchwood instead of gathering dust while he focused only on what would earn him the most money.

He wasn't certain how Rose and Jackie were dealing with losing their world, but Mickey assured him that with time, Rose would get better.

* * *

"Come on, Rose. You've gotta do something." Mickey sat precariously at the foot of Rose's bed. Like she did on all of her days off, she had chosen to sleep in. It was better than having nothing to do all day. She looked up at her friend, but quite meet his eyes. They all felt sorry for her, and she was trying not to feel sorry for herself. She was getting sick of living day to day with no purpose. She felt like she had before she met the Doctor. Each day she expected some change, but she did nothing to bring that change about.

Rose made a decision and lifted her eyes to meet Mickey's for the first time in months. Worry filled his gaze, but there was no pity there.

"What do you suggest?" They both knew that travel was out of the question, working an ordinary job hadn't fit either.

"What about school? I've been thinking about taking a class, since Gran's pressing me to 'make something of myself.'" Rose smiled as she imagined Mickey's Gran hitting him with her cane while she demanded that he return to school. Hearing Mickey talk about his Gran reminded her that not everything in this new world was about loss. "I mean, your dad can afford to send you somewhere fancy, and Gran's been hinting that he should give me some money for school after all I did to fight the Cybermen." Mickey looked a little embarrassed, but Rose understood. Mickey was always giving up himself for other people, even if he complained loudly while doing it.

"School doesn't sound too bad." Learning something new would give her something to think about, and maybe it might make her feel just a little bit closer to the Doctor.

* * *

"I'm so proud of you, Rose." Her mother's hug and the sloppy kiss on her cheek from Tony made her beam. It had taken a little while for her to get used to having a little brother, especially one so much younger than her. With Tony's birth, Pete's reluctance to let her call him 'Dad' had completely disappeared. His contacts in the government had even forged papers for Rose to show that she had been born to Pete and Jackie before he was rich and had been raised by a family member while they struggled to stay afloat financially. After that, she had apparently gone to a fancy boarding school, though anyone who heard her talk would know that was a lie.

"I just wish the Doctor could see this. Our Rose, a doctor in her own right." Mickey's pride warmed her and she pulled her best friend in for a hug. "Not that he would believe it.

"Hey!" Rose glared before attacking Mickey, intent on making him pay for that comment.

"Torchwood is excited on having you join the team. They've been reading all your papers about the theory behind inter-dimensional travel. I think they know something that they haven't been telling me." Her dad's worried look stopped Rose and Mickey. There had been signs lately of something going wrong. Slowly, the stars seemed to be going out. Darkness spread across the evening skies and Rose knew that there had to be some way to stop it.

"Well, since I start on Monday morning, I'm sure they'll tell me what they want me to do then." Rose reviewed the data in her head. There had to be a turning point, some linchpin, that would change the course of events for the better. The Doctor always seemed to find it, and she would figure out a way to do it this time.

She was Rose Tyler, and she would save the Earth.


	3. Chapter 2: The Journey's Ending

_A/N: This chapter is set directly following the Tardis's exit from Bad Wolf Bay during Journey's End. Angst abounds. (Tentoo uses the names of three Classic Who companions to make his new name.)_

Rose's heart broke for a second time on the shores of Bad Wolf Bay. Had she seen her future when she looked into the Tardis and realized that everything would end here? Was the name "Bad Wolf" just a reflection of her end? If she were still the Bad Wolf, she would part the Void as if it were nothing more than a curtain and step back onto the Tardis in mid-flight. She focused on that image, rather than on the bleak shoreline and the haze that muted all the colors in this place.

"Rose…" She turned, looking up into the familiar face of the stranger she had just kissed. With his hands in his pockets and his coat hanging open, he looked like her Doctor, but there was something wrong.

"You aren't completely him, are you?" The man shook his head slightly. "You're a bit more Donna than he realized." The Doctor probably hadn't noticed the difference in movement or word choices between himself and this new version. He sometimes ignored the small things while focusing on the larger problem. What to do with this untried Doctor ranked higher than making sure that she would be happy with him.

"I'm both of them, the Doctor and Donna. I have their memories and emotions, but I'm a new person just being shaped by the old. I can't change that, and I can't be just him, Rose." She relaxed and held out her hand to him. If he was willing to be honest with her, she could give him the courtesy of getting to know him, instead of just pretending he was the man she had fallen in love with. It was like seeing a new regeneration of the Doctor, only this time he was different inside instead of the outside.

"Well, if you're something new, what should we call you?" If he wasn't the Doctor and wasn't Donna either, he should have a name of his own." The brown eyes focused on her lit with excitement.

"I'd better get on that, then." He grinned broadly and sauntered away from her, down towards the water.

"What a strange man," Jackie mused. Rose turned to her mum.

"Can you call Dad and get him to pick us up? I don't fancy having to walk to the next town." She hunched her shoulders, a habit that she had tried to break, but that still came back when she was nervous. Jackie's face softened from the stern lines that it usually took around the Doctor. Jackie nodded and fumbled in her pocket for her cellphone.

Rose took off down the beach, away from her mother and the New Doctor. She just wanted a bit of peace, and some time to take in what had just happened. Spray from the water hit her as she wandered closer to the rocks and cliffs that bordered the bay. At least the setting fit her mood. It was an inhospitable place and one fit for someone who felt terribly alone.

The man she loved had left her again and this time, not even her best friend had stayed with her. She had her family and this new man who had been given to her like some sort of consolation prize at a faire. She hadn't won the bright toy that she had wanted, just a pale imitation. Being unfair felt justified right then. Being angry at the Doctor was always easier than missing him, even though she wouldn't be able to hold on to that anger. He had given her what he thought was best, without asking her opinion.

The Doctor failed to ask if she wanted to go back to Pete's World. Her family would miss her, but they would have accepted it, since they knew better than anyone else what the Doctor meant to her. She and this copy of the Doctor could have stayed with him, traveling with the Doctor and Donna. But the Doctor had never forgotten his promise to her mother. He would always bring Rose home.

She stared down the beach, watching the man with his trousers rolled up to his knees, bending over to take samples from the water of the bay. A smile crossed her lips. He had obviously taken some of the Doctor's supplies, because she couldn't figure out where else he had gotten the series of vials that she could see growing on the shore, just outside of the water's reach.

Rose sat down with her back against a rock, not caring that sand would get into her clothes. After the last few months, she deserved a rest. Using the Dimensional Cannon had just been the last step of a process that had been going on for awhile. Being intimately involved in the creation of the cannon had kept her up more nights that she would let her mother know about. There were no worlds to save for the moment.

"Your father had better get here soon. Tony's probably beside himself." Her mother's footsteps ground through the sand, drawing Rose from the half-doze that she had fallen into. Jackie sat down next to her and continued to talk. Rose let the familiar sound of her mother's voice soothe her.

Pete arrived a few hours later, apologizing to Jackie and casting questioning glances at the New Doctor. Rose wondered how to begin the explanation when a force hitting her leg nearly toppled her over into the sand.

"Dad let me fly!" The little blonde boy bounced on the tips of his toes, trying to make himself taller. Rose grinned and bent down to pick up her brother, who was getting far too heavy to be carried anymore. With three adults to care for him, Tony was spoiled, but only with attention.

"That's brilliant!" She glanced over at the New Doctor. "Tony, there's someone I want you to meet. He's going to be staying with us for awhile." Her glare dared her mother to contradict her. "His name's…" A shadow fell over them as the Copy stepped forward.

"James Stuart Smith. Very nice to meet you, Tony Tyler. Oh, that rhymes! Well, alliterates actually but who cares. Tony Tyler, I like it!" Rose bit her tongue when he said the name. He wasn't exactly "John Smith" anymore, so who was she to question his choice? And knowing the Doctor, and having met Donna, perhaps it was better if she didn't question it.

Tony hid his head in Rose's shoulder and refused to look at the newly dubbed "James."

"I don't think he likes you much." Jackie laughed and shoved the man out of the way to get at her son.

"But kids love me." Rose tried not to smile at the hurt look on his face. If someone had taken away his sonic screwdriver, that would be the exact face that he would wear. Maybe having him around wouldn't be as hard as she feared.

"Tony's a bit shy. You'll win him over eventually."

Rose set her brother down and started to follow him up the flight of stairs that had lowered from the zeppelin. As she took each step, she studied the landscape of Bad Wolf Bay, a place that would always be equated with loss in her mind. She never wanted to set foot on that sand again, unless it was to claim the Doctor, her Doctor, as her own.


End file.
